


a fate that befell me

by lovemutt



Series: sit back and watch the world go by [1]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: AKA I can do what I want, Canon? What Canon?, Childhood Trauma, Dragon Age Inquisition Spoilders, Dragon Age Inquisition Twins AU, Gen, Mage Inquisitor (Dragon Age), Mages and Templars, Other, Reunions, Trevelyan (Dragon Age) has Sibling(s), Trevelyan Twins - Freeform, Twin AU, Warrior Inquisitor (Dragon Age) - Freeform, but they're minor, idk prolly more, templars take children more at 11
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-05
Updated: 2019-07-05
Packaged: 2020-06-16 03:20:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19636780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovemutt/pseuds/lovemutt
Summary: Stag Trevelyan was always a very skilled little girl, and her twin brother Doe was no different. Well, at least until his magic developed. Stag spent her entire childhood mourning the loss of her brother who was dragged off to the Circle, and her aspirations of freeing him disappeared the older she got. Just as she was forcing herself to accept that she'd become the very thing she hated... The Conclave happened.





	a fate that befell me

**Author's Note:**

> dragon age fanfiction uwu  
> minor spoilers for the main plot, no details, but it sort of gives away some of the main plot foreshadowing.

From a young age, Stag Trevelyan had known loneliness. Born to a loving but large family, she was thought of after all her other siblings, and her closest friend in the world was her twin brother, Doe. He was her closest friend, at least. As Doe grew, he began to develop more and more magical abilities, and try as she might, Stag couldn’t help him hide it. They both knew what happened to mages, moreso mages in their family, and it shook her to her core to think of what would become of her brother if their parents found out.

Her fears came true soon after, when Doe set fire to a shed on their land while they were playing and neither of the children could come up with a convincing lie quick enough. Just as soon as Doe was discovered, he was cast away, his name becoming something no one spoke. Any mention of the boy made Stag’s nanny shush her, made her mother grimace, and made the servants scurry away.

The dreams of watching her brother being encircled by Templars and dragged away plagued her every night, and soon enough she stopped trying to explain to her nanny why she woke up crying because any mention of Doe was ignored.

Stag Trevelyan knew loneliness. She never found another child to play with, her parents never had time for her between their other children and their duties, and she wasn’t allowed to send letters to Doe. She spent her time practicing with a sword, ignoring her parents off-handed pleas when they found the time to eat dinner with their children of being more lady-like, maybe giving up the sword to practice her sewing.

But Stag didn’t like sewing, she liked swinging her sword around. She liked chipping off pieces of the practice dummies every day until they had to be fixed or replaced a few weeks later, and the blisters on her hands, and the feeling of knowing that one day she’s be strong enough to get Doe back. 

She stayed like that for years, practicing her swordsmanship, eventually winning her parents confidence as a warrior. Her dream of getting her brother back eventually lost it’s fervor throughout the years, and Stag resigned herself to the mortifying reality of everything. She was to be a warrior and serve her family, though the Chantry or the Templars depending on what they saw fit for her, and Doe was most likely made tranquil, or, Maker willing, killed. She would have no way of knowing now, since her parents had gone on to act as if nothing had ever happened, like they never had a son named Doe.

Like he never existed. Like Stag’s memories were all just fever dreams she made throughout her childhood of isolation. Throughout her romantic exploits, she’s asked servant girls if they remembered her long-forgotten brother, but they always seemed flustered and dodged the question, no doubt under the threat of punishment from a young age that they were still fearful of.

But then…Then the Conclave happened.  
Stag was sent there for the same reason she was sent anywhere, she was skilled. There to aid her family and nothing else, to be a bodyguard and pretend the Templars giving the mages in the room dirty looks didn’t make her skin crawl. She recognized one of them from when Doe was taken, and all the feelings from her childhood threatened to bubble up again, only kept down by the chant she spoke to herself that they were in a holy place.

And then… Something happened. Something she wouldn’t remember until much later, but she awoke in a hellscape that made the hairs on her neck stand up, and the next few minutes were a blur of fear and sweat as she tried to escape from something terrifying, only to be spit out on the ground in a place she almost recognized.

Everything that happened after is now just a blur as her time in Fade. All the fighting, the debating as soon as she woke up just to try and keep her head on her shoulders, literally. It was a nightmare, and she begged Cassandra to just ask her parents, or the family that was there.

Stag wasn’t actually surprised when she found out everyone that went with her were dead. Some part of her ached as soon as she heard about it all, and she had to stop herself from curling in on herself in fear. She wanted her mother in that moment. Regardless of the anger she still held against them for Doe, for her childhood, they were her parents, and she needed them.

When Cassandra drug her around to reach the now destroyed Temple, and even from a mile away the smell of the burning could reach her nose. She clamered her way through the field, picking up an elven mage and dwarf along the way to help her in her exploits. She can remember how she felt safer around them, now that it wasn’t just her and a scary lady. The elf was nice enough to her. The dwarf told jokes.

But then.

Then a miracle. They were arriving at the Temple, the scorched Earth around them making Stag’s heart ache, and then a chill swept over her. She looked up, recognizing the crackle in the air to be purely magical, assuming it to be a mage like the elf. But it wasn’t. It wasn’t.

Stag had never run that fast in her life, not even when she had a bear hot on her heels during a hunting trip. Thinking back, she must have confused the group she had gathered to no end, Cassandra probably thought the worst (Stag could hear it now, ‘She was lying! A mage conspirator!’), but she had no time to think of that as she breathed out his name, watching the perfect resemblance of her brother whirl around and point his staff at her.

She barely slowed down, tears welling up in her eyes, and Stag could barely manage a ‘Doe, put it down’ before he recognized her just as quickly, his staff hitting the ground as he met her half way. It had been years, yet they somehow both still looked the same. No doubt the confusion grew from her soon-to-be friends as her and this strange mage hugged in the field, Stag even picking him up and twirling them around as she laughed, face buried in his chest. They must have been easily confused for separated lovers until you actually looked at them.

The same round nose, the freckles, the same silly ears.

Twins.

Stag couldn’t remember being that happy for years beforehand. Only the crackle of the fade rift above them drew her out of her stupor, and she set her brother down, pointing to his staff and drawing her sword as more demons were spawned.

And the rest is history. Literally. History that was written down as the Inquisition was formed, as Stag led them all with her brother at her side, history that had foreshadowing scrawled in the margins of every page with warning labels.

History that still has Dread Wolf underlined three times and in bolded letters every time her dear friend did something that made sense looking back.


End file.
